Criminal Defense Law Blog

With the legalization of marijuana for recreational and medicinal uses across the country, police and legislators are scrambling for accurate devices that can detect a person’s impairment for driving under the influence of marijuana. Most law enforcement agencies rely on observation and specific cognitive and field balance tests by certified drug recognition experts (DRE). However,…

When New Jersey Attorney General Gurbir Grewal issued a memorandum yesterday ordering local prosecutors to temporarily halt marijuana prosecutions in municipal courts until September, news outlets, including the New York Times, called it a possible “step toward decriminalization.” Amol Sinha, American Civil Liberties Union of New Jersey executive director, praised the move, stating that “[b]y…

New Jersey, a small but densely populated State, has 21 counties and 565 municipalities. Right now there are 515 Municipal Courts – 316 have individual, stand-alone courts, 173 municipalities share services, while the remaining 76 municipalities have agreed to form 24 separate joint Municipal Courts. Each have their own judges, prosecutors, public defenders, court administrators…

After more than two years of careful research and deliberation, the National Association of Criminal Defense Lawyers (NACDL) released The Trial Penalty: The Sixth Amendment Right to Trial on the Verge of Extinction and How to Save It. The “trial penalty” refers to the substantial difference between the sentence offered prior to trial versus the…

Last week’s decision in Carpenter v. United States, a 5-4 decision that the government must obtain a court-authorized warrant for cell site location information (CSLI), is a small step toward recognizing privacy rights in an age of ever-expanding technology. Most people do not realize that their cell phones are capable of tracking their every movement…

In Fox News coverage of the one-year anniversary of Special Prosecutor Robert Mueller’s investigation into Russian meddling in the 2016 presidential election, In Kaitlyn Schallhorn’s May 17, 2018 coverage of Michael Flynn’s legal options, Ms.Schallhorn quotes Mr. Stahl: Robert Stahl, a white-collar criminal defense attorney in New York and New Jersey, told Fox News withdrawing…

Headlines and tweets coming out of Washington have put a spotlight on law enforcement’s use of informants, now known in federal parlance as “confidential human sources” or CHS. Putting aside the political theater and self-serving spin of the “criminal deep state” and the planting of spies, how are informants used in every day investigations? Using…

While most people consider themselves unlikely to become the subject of a police investigation, there is one common situation in which ordinary citizens fall under police scrutiny: the traffic stop. Police officers are trained to search for evidence of illegal activity every time they pull over a driver, whatever the reason for the stop. While…

President Trump tweeted that Michael Cohen, his former lawyer and “fixer”, won’t flip on him. Putting aside for the moment why the President would say this if Cohen didn’t have incriminating evidence against him – because one could only “flip” on someone if they did – let’s examine why people charged with crimes cooperate with…

In recent days we have witnessed the President and various pundits scream (or tweet) that the attorney-client privilege is dead or under serious attack. What they are referring to, of course, is the judicially authorized search of Michael Cohen’s home, office and hotel room by the FBI. Cohen is said to be one of the…